There was a flaw in my plan, such as it was.
So, I’ve been working really hard for a couple of weeks..complex, new stuff, kind of flying by the seat of my pants while keeping all the balls in the air, long hours etc. Then I went for a weekend at the coast, which, while wonderful, was exhausting in its own way. AND my 80-something year old bios (biological family) are swinging through Portland and alighting for the night in my little house in….oh….about 36 hours.
Anyway…..yesterday when I got home, I was pretty much wiped out. The day had been a success, but I was kind of done. So I rejected the planned tuna salad, talked E into procuring a fried chicken dinner (with jojos!) from Freddies, ate said dinner at, oh, about 4pm. Drank 2.5 glasses of delicious wine, and ate a few too many of J’s amazing cowboy chocolate chip cookies. These cookies are being made for multiple purposes – gifts to the new neighbors…something for the bios coming in….but yeah – they’re actually for me. Well, no, they’re actually not…but last night, they were.
Also, there is a list as long as my arm of things that need to get done before my Mother arrives (yeah….two aunts and an uncle are also arriving…but in my mind’s eye, the thing that floats to the top and screams is YOUR MOTHER IS COMING TO VISIT). I had lofty plans for after work chores – trimming the roses, mopping the kitchen, sanitizing the bedroom and living room (you know…the thing where you eye your living space with the perspective of an elderly relative, and remove things that are likely to send them into a tizzy), dusting everything (my personal most loathed chore). Well…..I strong armed myself into dusting my bedroom, and counted it as good.
So, there I was. Sitting in the living room at 6pm…stuffed with chicken, cookies, and wine. Accomplished enough, task-wise. Disinclined to watch the Olympics.
I entertained aspirations of amusing myself with Facebook, but frankly – it couldn’t hold my interest. So yeah – I essentially went to bed at 6pm. Now, I had every intention of reading for awhile (maybe even until a reasonable bedtime!) but the truth of the matter is that I was basically sound asleep by, oh, 6:45 pm.
Which was great! Until about an hour ago. Just so you know – an hour ago was midnight. Yeah…12 am. I’d been asleep for about five hours, and…now I’m awake. I lay there for awhile and pretended that I might get back to sleep…but who am I fooling. I’m awake. The flaw in the plan.
So I got up. For what it’s worth, I left the air conditioner AND the heated mattress pad on in my bedroom. I mean, I could get sleepy and go back to bed, right?
Tomorrow (today, I guess, in reality) is a telework day. Honestly, I knew that going in (especially the wine part) otherwise, I never would have gone to bed at 6pm. My work day starts at 6am, so that’s only…*glancing at the clock*…five hours from now. Plenty of time to accomplish stuff, AND maybe get a cat nap, right? I am a dedicated and serious teleworker…I get dressed to telework (although I do wear comfy clothes, rather than work drag), and ‘report to work’ on the dot, at the dining room table. The thing is, I can pretty much just get up, get dressed, and ‘go to work’ – no commute or cosmetics required! I don’t even have to comb my hair. I just get up, feed the cat, get dressed, and start working.
Speaking of the cat…he dutifully appeared when he heard me get up, although he was clearly confused. He meowed kind of half-heartedly to be fed, and, as I basically ignored him, he has now fallen flat asleep underneath the kitchen barstools. I’m talking half-curled, head flat on the floor asleep. I can hear E snoring downstairs – or maybe it’s J in her bedroom, not sure. I didn’t uncrate the dog, although I’m pretty sure she’d come out….blink sleepily….gamely follow me into the dining room….and conk out like the cat.
So. Here I sit….it’s 1:09 a.m. by the computer clock. What to do now? I made coffee and put the living room back together (apparently, J got distracted from her routine and checked out before doing her pre-bed chores). The coffee is strong, and I resisted putting cream in it. I know what’s ahead in the real day – logging on to work at 6am, working through the list of tasks I need to do while teleworking. Taking the dog to the groomer at 9am. Picking her up at noon. Meeting a friend at the dog park at 3:30 p.m.
There is also that arm-long list of pre-bio visit chores. Weed the front and trim the roses? Ain’t happening in the middle of the night. I could dust the living room…and that will likely happen, I can do that without making a whole lot of noise. And maybe mop the kitchen floor. Oo! I could definitely sanitize the bedroom and living room. Can’t start the laundry or run the big vacuum cleaner. I could probably water the houseplants without too much of a ruckus, although running the water in the middle of the quiet house in the middle of the silent night is noisier than one might expect. Said noise also puts a kibosh on taking a shower. Refilling vitamins, though, is a possibility.
This awake in the middle of the night thing wouldn’t really be an issue if I were already retired. I actually don’t mind being awake in the wee hours. It’s quiet and dark and cool…it’s a great time to write. Companion animals tend to be companionate, but calm and un-needy (the cat is too sleepy to yell for food, and there is nothing for the dog to bark at). Human household members tend to stay asleep and punctuate the night with the somehow comforting sounds of snoring behind closed doors. My thing is that because I’m still working, I need to be able to more or less conform to the Monday – Friday, 9 – 5 workday, and be functional, alert, and reasonably agreeable. This middle-aged waking up in the middle of the night thing doesn’t go too well with the 9 – 5 gig. Actually, in my case, it’s more like 6am – 3pm ish…but whatever. I have at least seven more years of the full time employment, get-up-go-to-work routine, though.
So, I guess I will publish this….then make my rounds of Facebook and email….drink a little more coffee….maybe uncrate the dog (maybe not)..and dust the living room. Maybe I’ll get sleepy enough in a bit to go back to bed for awhile. I’m thinking probably not, since this coffee is pretty danged strong. I’d go outside and sit on the porch, but it hasn’t been despidered lately (that will definitely happen before bios arrive!) and I get the heeby-jeebies. Simply can’t abide spiders, just can’t.
“The woods are lovely, dark and deep
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep…and miles to go before I sleep.”
– Robert Frost
The night is truly lovely, even though I haven’t walked out into it yet…I can feel it, just beyond the dining room window, pressing back against the pool of yellow electric light.